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StoryCorps 468: Tough Guys

In this week’s episode of the StoryCorps podcast, we hear stories from people who, at first blush, you would likely judge to be rough and tough. But listen to their stories and you’ll soon realize that appearances are often deceiving.

Our first story comes from Lendall Hill (pictured above with his daughter Lori FitzGerald) of West Virginia whose father, Vaunia, was a logger. When Vaunia was younger, he lost a leg in a farming accident and was fitted with an artificial leg made from paper, paint, and cables.

One day while delivering mining materials with Lendall at his side, Vaunia’s artificial leg got caught and became twisted at a strange angle. Vaunia decided to have a little fun at the expense of a coworker who did not know about his accident, so he told him that he had just broken his foot and proceeded to twist it back into place right in front of the man. Years later, Lendall’s uncle, Lon, ran into the man and much to his amusement, learned that Vaunia’s joke had had a lasting impact.

Our next story, by Tanya James (pictured above with her daughters Trista James and Michelle Paugh), also comes from West Virginia, where three generations of her family have worked in coal mines. In 1979, Tanya herself went underground, and being a woman, encountered a number of difficult work situations. She remembers learning from her own mother, also a miner, how to handle men who treated her poorly on the job and how to command respect — skills she passed on to her own daughters.

Tanya spent more than 20 years in the mines and recently became he first woman in her union to hold a seat on the international executive board. She came to StoryCorps to talk with her daughters about her work.

Our next story is part of StoryCorps’ Military Voices Initiative, a platform for veterans, service members, and military families to share their stories. Daniel Hodd came to StoryCorps with his mother, Evelyn (pictured together above), to discuss a difficult choice he faced when he was 17 years old. An accomplished pianist, he found himself at a crossroads — to either accept a scholarship to attend the Juilliard School or enlist in the United States Marine Corps.

Much to his mother’s dismay, Daniel chose the Marines, and just prior to his second deployment, an accident forced him to make another difficult decision — one that would ultimately put an end to his piano playing.

In our final story, we hear from a couple of bikers, Happy Dodson and Taz Roman (pictured tigether above). They are both members of a group called Bikers Against Child Abuse, a nonprofit established to lend support — emotional and physical — to abused children.

Children in difficult situations are often referred to Bikers Against Child Abuse by police officers and social workers, and Happy, Taz, and other members of the group are quick to drop everything and ride straight to a child in need to ensure that no child is compelled to carry the burden of abuse alone.

“Rhapsody in Blue” by George Gershwin played by Daniel Hodd

Transcript

StoryCorps 468: Tough Guys

[MUSIC – “Night Without Sleep (Instrumental)” by David Mumford]

Michael Garofalo (MG): It’s the StoryCorps podcast. I’m Michael Garofalo. In this episode, we’ve got stories about a type of person you may not readily associate with this show, which is also known as the podcast that makes you cry.

I’m talking about tough guys, roughnecks, rugged types.

Happy Dodson (HD): You got 15, 20 bikes rolling down the street, and everybody’s in leather.

Tanya James (TJ): And I was taught at an early age from my mother: if you don’t fight for yourself ain’t nobody else gonna do it for you.

Daniel Hodd (DH): “We got two options. You can either try some treatment plan, and you definitely won’t deploy, or you just cut it off and you get on a plane.” And I was like, “Cut it off,”

MG: And these stories have a lot to do with how we perceive someone like this. You know, we look at a person, we see them as a tough guy, we think we know what that means about them, but do we really understand who or what we’re seeing?

We’ll find out, after this short break.

[MUSIC OUT]

MG: Welcome back. And in this episode, we have stories about people who are undeniably tough, but maybe not in the way they seem at first glance. Let’s start with Lendall Hill remembering his dad, who was a logger in West Virginia.

[TAPE Hill]

Lendall Hill (LH): My dad got his leg cut off in a farming accident and at that time the artificial legs was made out of paper with varnish and they were put around a mold and there was cables in the ankles that connected the leg to the foot. There were some interesting times with that old leg.

One time we were delivering mining materials and there was a timber checker that was up on top of the truck and he had to look at every timber that we were unloading and dad had pulled one of those timbers out and he stepped and got his artificial leg caught and as he turned it let out a pretty loud pop and he said, ”Oh darn, I think I broke my foot.” and he sat down on the running board of the truck and the foot was plainly broken it was turned at a right angle to what it should be and he caught his foot in his two hands and he straightened it up and it cracked and popped something awful and said, ”Oh darn, the thing is broke.” And he climbed back up on the truck and that timber checker had turned white as cotton and we didn’t think anything about it.

Several years later, Uncle Lon, dad’s brother, had run into the guy and he asked him, ”Are you any kin to that Vaunia Hill, that used to deliver mining materials?” Uncle Lon says, ”Sure that’s my brother.” The timber checker said, ”I’ll tell you one thing. That is the toughest man I ever seen. He broke his foot and climbed back up and finished unloading that truck.” Uncle Lon was laughing so hard tears were rolling down his cheeks. But he never did tell the guy that it was an artificial leg.

[MUSIC – “Smoothie Song” by Nickel Creek]

MG: That’s Lendall Hill with his daughter, Lori FitzGerald.

[MUSIC OUT]

Our second story also comes from West Virginia, and a woman who had to prove her toughness. Tanya James comes from a family of coal miners – three generations of her family went underground to work. And she started in the mines herself in 1979. At that time, only about one in 100 coal miners were women. In fact, it was a long-held superstition among miners that it was bad luck for a woman to even enter a mine. So, this was the kind of work environment that Tanya, who was still a teenager when she started, walked into. She spoke about that with her daughters at StoryCorps.

[TAPE James]

Tanya James (TJ): My dad passed away when I was 17. My mother still had to take care of the family and so she decided to take the mining class. And I’d go down with her every day. The instructor said, “Well if you’re going to come down here every day, you might as well take the class too.” She started in the mines, and six months later I started in.

Michelle Paugh (MP): When I was younger I remember watching you get ready and go to work, wondering if you was going to come back home that night or not.

TJ: I understand how you girls felt. I know what it feels like to have your mother in the mines. And it could be a little rough. So I was pretty protective of her even though I knew she could protect herself. I seen her pick up a guy by the neck [laughs]. So she was a tough cookie. And I was taught at an early age from my mother: if you don’t fight for yourself ain’t nobody else gonna do it for you.

When I was hired, a lot of people thought the only reason women wanted in the mines was to find ‘em a man. And for the first six months you’re not allowed to be by yourself. I remember one time they sent me and this one man back into a part of the mines that nobody goes into. And he started getting a little too friendly. I told him, “Don’t touch me.” Well the third time he approached me, he put his hands on my shoulders and when he did, I just brought my knee up. I hit him true and hit the mark [laughs]. And he went down, rolled and cried and throwed up. He got the point. He never bothered me again.

You had to make them respect you. You had to prove yourself daily. But I don’t believe in stuff being handed to you. I think you need to work for everything you get. If it ain’t worth working for, it ain’t worth having in my opinion.

MP: You kind of brought us up a little the same way.

TJ: I think you’ve proved to me more than once that you’re not going to let anyone run over you, and I’m proud of you for it.

TJ: You’re an extraordinary woman and I’d like to be one one day too.

[MUSIC – “Cowboy” by Vexed to Nightmare]

MG: Tanya James with her daughters, Michelle Paugh and Trista James. They spoke in Morgantown, West Virginia. Tanya spent more than 20 years in the mines, and recently, she became the first woman in her union to hold a seat on the international executive board.

Next up, we’ll hear from our Military Voices Initiative, recording conversations between veterans and their families. And this story is about a tough choice.

It comes from Daniel Hodd. When he was seventeen, Daniel found himself at a crossroads — He could either accept a scholarship to study piano at the prestigious Juilliard School of Music, or he could join the US Marine Corps.

He came to StoryCorps to talk about that choice with his mother, Evelyn.

[TAPE Hodd]

Evelyn Hodd (EH): At three years of age, you walked over to the piano, and you just started playing. And you played until you were what, 17? You performed in the Metropolitan Opera Theater. And I thought we might take up Julliard’s offer, they had granted you half a scholarship. However, you had made a decision to go in the military. That was devastating for me. And then, you had an accident…

Daniel Hodd (DH): Yeah, we were doing our pre-deployment training. And I walked up to one of the vehicles and I went to open one of the doors and the door just kind of snapped three fingers. So they sent me to a specialist and they were like, ”You know your finger’s broken, right? You can’t deploy with a broken bone in your body.” To hear that you can’t deploy because of less that one inch piece of your body, just seemed absurd to me. And I had a couple dozen junior Marines who expected certain things of me. And I promised them I would get out there as soon as I could. Ultimately, the specialist told me, “We got two options. You can either try some treatment plan, and you definitely won’t deploy, or you just cut it off and you get on a plane.” And I was like, ”Cut it off,” because you know, I made a promise. I had to deploy. In some ways that decision was difficult, in other ways it was one of the easiest decisions I’ve ever made. I would be a very different person today, I think, had I graduated from music school and not joined the Marine Corps. But that’s not a decision that I regret. I know that that hurt you and I’m sorry.

EH: Well, I am so awfully proud of you, you have no idea. The fact that you have given all to your country over what I wanted for you or even what you would’ve pursued, it says a lot for who you are.

DH: Well, I didn’t give all. Many people gave a lot more but uh… thank you and I love you.

EH: Love you too.

[MUSIC – “Rhapsody in Blue” by George Gershwin played by Daniel Hodd]

MG: That’s Evelyn Hodd with her son Staff Sergeant Daniel Hodd, an Iraq veteran and former concert pianist. Right now, we’re hearing Daniel at the piano. He’s playing Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.”

[MUSIC OUT]

MG: For our last story, we hit the road with a pair of bikers, though you might be surprised at where they’re headed.

Happy Dodson and Taz Roman are members of a group called Bikers Against Child Abuse.

Here’s how it works. Bikers pass a federal background check and then they can join this group. And then social workers and cops refer children who have been abused to the bikers. When they don’t feel safe, the kids call Happy, Taz and their other biker friends who ride straight to the child’s house.

[TAPE Dodson/Roman]

Happy Dodson (HD): You got 15, 20 bikes rolling down the street, and everybody’s in leather. You know, everybody works, and everybody’s got everything else going on, but we drop all that stuff for that kid.

Taz Roman (TR): We have a kid right now, and she goes up to any biker.

HD: And she’ll let you know real quick she’s in our family.

TR: Yeah. [Laughs].

HD: I remember the first day we gave her the vest, just like we wear. She put it on, and her mom said she slept with it for three days—wouldn’t take it off.

HD: And then they realize that, hey, there are adults that we can trust and will take care of us. There’s just no way to describe the feeling. And normally I’m not a soft person, huh, Taz?

TR: [Laughs]

HD: So you better not say nothing about this to anybody.

TR: I don’t know nothing about nothing [Laughs].

HD: So why’d you get involved?

TR: My stepdad, you know, he’d come home drunk and start wailing on me every single night. I used to think it was my fault, and it was hard growing up like that. I think as a kid, you always feel like you’re alone. You’re going to bed with this burden every single night, and you wake up knowing exactly what’s going to happen the next day. You’re so scared that you don’t know how to go about talking to somebody about it. So, if I can help kids overcome their fear of their abuser, then maybe that’ll help me deal with the history that I came from.

HD: I wish it was something we didn’t have to do.

TR: I feel exactly the same way. At the end of the day, you want these kids to have a better future than you could have possibly had. When I put my kid to bed, that’s what I think about. You don’t just want it for your kid, you want it for everybody’s kid. And I think that’s what helps me sleep better at night.

[MUSIC – “Missing” by Vexed to Nightmare]

MG: That’s Happy Dodson and Taz Roman, members of Bikers Against Child Abuse. They spoke in Norwich, Connecticut.

[MUSIC – “Hot Foreign Pen Pal” by Lover Lips]

MG: And that’s it for this episode. These stories were produced by Yasmina Guerda, Jasmyn Belcher-Morris, and me. The podcast is produced by Elisheba Ittoop.

Find out what music we used in this episode on our website StoryCorps dot org. And don’t forget to let us know what you think of this podcast. Leave us a review on iTunes. We really do read them all. I’m Michael Garofalo. Until next time, thanks for listening.